Sylvia as she starts sky diving without a parachute
She couldn't even manage concern. She faced her doom this time around like a gambler with a pat hand. Oblivion was bluffing. Showboating, even.
This excerpt is probably the most chilling description of Parson yet:
"But then, the mountain shook. I thought it was more traps, but the walls all fell and the ground cracked, and the city exploded. I stood there in the ashen rain and met my Fate. I croaked that turn, burned alive by the very ground I stood upon." Her smile broadened now, and seemed eerily at odds with the story she was relating. "But as it was happening, I felt something else, Warlord."
Sylvia pulled her armored shoulders in toward her body, smiling like she had been given a warm blanket on a cold night. "I felt another power. Not greater, but closer. More active. More alive. And just as alien. I never knew what it could have been, but my Lady Wanda was kind enough to explain it. Do you know what that power was, Warlord?"
Not for the first time today, Ossomer was lost. "I do not."
She smiled and closed her eyes. "It was Lord Hamster with an idea."
"I...see," said Ossomer, dubiously.
"You will," said Sylvia, snapping her head toward him suddenly. "This city will yet burn." Her eyes drifted away to a point in the sky. "I rather hope he will burn down the whole world."
I consider this excerpt from Parson's klog to accurately sum up the story's entire premise:
"There are all these things that seem familiar from the reality that I know, but everything is cute. Like it's been made safe for children. The people even look like children.
Except that they die. What is that?"
One gets the feeling that Parson and Charlie are having too much fun sparring with one another, at times - a Battle of the Brains, in a sense.
CharlsNChrg: That was clever, though, right?
LordHamster: Sure.
LordHamster: Determining the decision not to spend all the calculations. Cost: one calculation.
CharlsNChrg: :)
LordHamster: Teaching me that my bracer can make sophisticated predictions about the future? Priceless.
CharlsNChrg: ...
CharlsNChrg: Simple. Croak a "Tool."
CharlsNChrg: If an attuned wielder of an Arkentool were to croak, it would seem to be pretty compelling evidence that the Titans were not on their side. Don't you think?
CharlsNChrg: Perhaps it's an experiment that ought to be carried out.
LordHamster: Oh, Charlie...
LordHamster: I know business sucks, but that's no reason to start talking about suicide.
CharlsNChrg: ...
CharlsNChrg: Parson, is it actually your goal to make me hate you more every time we chat?
LordHamster: Me? I'm just talking.
